Claim the Victory

seal my heart and break my pride

As my last post clearly demonstrates, I have a bit of a control problem. When I don’t know what’s going on, I have the horrible tendency to freak my freak. If I understand something, then I feel like things are in order. If I don’t, well that just isn’t ok with me. This need for me to come to an understanding of something is handy when it comes to things like chemistry and math. However, it is soul-killing when it comes to me believing that I can figure out how God works. So what is the little voice that tells me I can reduce the Creator of the universe into a formula? Pride. Not only was it the cause of the fall, but it is at the root of everything else that keeps us from God. As said in a horribly stereotypical Christian movie that I couldn’t stop watching on Netflix, “Scratch the surface of any sin and you’ll find pride underneath.”

After seeing once again that I could use some humility in my life, I’ve also been reminded that I’m not going to figure out everything and how it’s all going to turn out before it happens. How quickly I forget that life is always moving forward, but God is merciful when it comes to my stubborn heart. I just need to trust the process, and stop trying to understand how life works. Easier typed than lived. 

"God is not what you imagine or what you think you understand. If you understand you have failed." -St. Augustine

Questions

when all of a sudden i am unaware of these afflictions eclipsed by Glory, and i realize just how beautiful You are and how great Your affections are for me

The other day when this came on it seemed like I was hearing it for the first time, and it was great. After listening to the song some more I found that this line actually describes what I’m afraid of, which is good and bad. It's good because up until now I haven’t been able to say what exactly it is that scares me, and bad because now I have to deal with that fear. I’m afraid that I won't see His Glory shine through my afflictions. 

What if I’ve spent over a year thinking about this surgery, it comes, and nothing happens? 

What if after talking about how great God is, people don’t see Him?

What if I’m expecting something big, but I remain unchanged? 

What if I’m disappointed after all this waiting?
What if I fail?

What if all of my questions are never answered? 

Jesus and baseball

Last friday my familia and I went to the Diamondbacks game, which is one of my favorite things to do. The best part of the night wasn’t even the game, but the Crowder Band concert afterwards. Sitting in the ballpark was an amazing place to worship. To top it all of they played this...

If you’ve ever been around me when it’s played, you know how much I love it. As I told my brother, if I get to heaven and walk out of a dugout onto a field and sing Crowder forever, I wouldn’t complain. To which he replied, if you get to heaven I don’t think you’d really be complaining about anything. The wisdom that comes out of that kid’s mouth sometimes makes me forget that he's fifteen. Then he starts chasing a mosquito around the living room saying that he's going to dog whistle its brains out and confuse it with a flashlight app.

   

Revelation 7:16-17

They will not hunger or thirst anymore, nor will the sun or any heat strike them. For the Lamb who is in the center of the throne will shepherd them and lead them to springs of life-giving water, and God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.

The Date is Set

It’s official. My cysta is being taken out on June 6th. The day that I’ve only been able to think about hypothetically for the past year has finally become real. The plan is still to use a scope, which will only require a few small incisions. Except they may have to as the surgeon said, “open up your ribs a little.” Guess that's better than opening them a lot. Whether or not that happens will depend on what kind of adhesions I have from old surgeries, and they won’t know what those are like until I’m in surgery. The hospital stay will be a couple days, but that depends on how long it takes my chest tube to stop draining. Recovery will be 4-6 weeks, but how invasive the surgery is will make that time shorter or longer. Basically everything depends on something else, not much is known with any kind of certainty, and nothing will be determined until June 6th. 

All of those unknowns are starting to make me anxious. First off, because I’m not in control of anything. Then there’s anticipation since I’ve been waiting a while for the conclusion of my cysta saga. I’m fighting to remain confident knowing that God knows how this is all going to play out. He did plan everything, after all. But there is an intense battle going on between having that kind of faith and relying on myself instead. I want to have hope, but the first step in attaining that hope is enduring affliction. So I’m trying to be at rest knowing that if I seek His face throughout this, then His Presence and Glory will be shown. That is a concept that has only been words up until this point. Now that I have to live that out and suffer, I'm finding that my fight is just getting started.

Psalm 119:75-76

I know, Lord, that your edicts are just; though you afflict me, you are faithful. May your love comfort me in accord with your promise to your servant. 

Why Does That Guy Have a Blue Bonduni?

This past week I was in Northbrook, which is right outside of Chicago, for an extended visit for my godson’s first Communion. Much time was spent playing catch, pushing swings, wishing Adam Levine would marry me, and watching tae kwon do, little league, adult instructional hockey, lord of the rings, the lion king, and other various children’s shows. Oh, I just love the windy city.

2 John 1:4

I rejoiced greatly to find some of your children walking in the truth just as we were commanded by the Father.

Like a Sea Without a Shore

Have you ever had those times where your words seem like they can’t explain or describe what you are experiencing? That’s how it has been for the past month or two. There’s about a million and a half things I could talk to you about, but the words wouldn’t come when I’d try to write. Just know that my heart was full of pure joy for the last couple weeks of school. The freedom and transformation that I was feeling was amazing. Those few weeks were so powerful that I found myself being thankful for my dark season because without it I would have never been able to experience the joy that came with finally seeing the Light. I would rather have gone through everything this past year brought to be where I am now than to have stayed exactly where I was a year ago, a place where I was happy but not joyful, for the rest of my life. Even that statement seems to fall short in describing what was happening in my heart that last month of school, but it’s the best I have for you. 

My last night in Ogden we had what is now called a Fri-esta, and it was further proof that the friends I’ve found in Utah are some of the most incredible people I’ve ever met. Want to know how cool they are? Some of them might be coming to Prescott to visit this summer. Yeah, they’re pretty amazing. 

Leaving was not fun. Not at all. A few of us hung around for a while, and as I was sitting in an apartment that I would never be in again, (my second favorite behind one on North Dearborn Street in Chicago) I realized that the next day every routine and person I had been living with for the past few months would be gone. The summer that seemed distant for so long was right in front of me, and I had, and still have, no idea what it is going to look like. As my enhancing creativity professor would say, I was in a state of overwhelmption. 

You know that joy I was talking about earlier? Well that is the cure for overwhelmption. My joy came from seeing how God has been and continues to be in every single part of my life. Classes, work, recent conversations and old ones, books, music, and people. I used to see everything as being connected like one giant diagram with arrows going in all directions. Except now after seeing how everything is connected, my diagram of how God works has turned into a picture of me being completely surrounded and consumed by the ocean that is His Love (this song knows what I'm talking about). So I don’t really know all the details of this summer, but this year has taught me that God will be there through it all. And I hope that my heart remains soft so that simply knowing He’s promised to never forsake me will be enough. 

There is one thing that I did know for certain that last night in Ogden. The title of Utah family no longer exists. You all are my family. Friends that I miss so much that the other day I was planning on having some quiet time in a coffee shop, but when I figured out I wouldn’t be at All the Perks, I didn’t want to go anymore. Seven hundred miles has never seemed so far.

Deuteronomy 31:6

Be brave and steadfast; have no fear or dread of them, for it is the Lord, your God, who marches with you; he will never fail you or forsake you.